My top 10 things to watch Monday, May 18 1. S & P futures stage a comeback, and we’re now on track for a flat open. Oil prices have retreated from their morning highs. President Donald Trump said last night on Truth Social that the “clock is ticking” for Iran, and that “they better get moving fast” on a peace deal. Not the first time Trump has made threats like this. Hard to keep track. 2. Weak batch of April economic data out of China. Growth slowed across the board, with retail sales reaching a 40-month low. Industrial output and investment growth both missed expectations, too. Could we be looking at a possible aggressive stimulus? Didn’t think that would be in the cards again. 3. Wow: Bank of America analysts reinstate coverage of Club name Salesforce with a sell rating and $160 price target. They see a need for an AI-driven structural reset at Salesforce. They’re worried about customer additions, upsell potential, and monetization pathways. We have also been frustrated with Salesforce for a while. CEO Marc Benioff continues to fight the alleged SaaSpocalypse. 4. On the other hand, fellow software vendor ServiceNow is reinstated with a buy at Bank of America and a $130 price target. Enterprise software has been crushed this year on AI disruption fears. Analysts see agentic AI as an opportunity for ServiceNow rather than a hindrance. 5. NextEra Energy will buy Dominion Energy to create the world’s largest regulated electric utility , aimed at keeping up with AI’s insatiable appetite for electricity. In my Sunday column , I wrote that so much power is needed that coal and natural gas, as means of generating it, keep emerging as avenues to prosperity. 6. A county southwest of Dallas has passed a one-year moratorium on data center building in unincorporated areas. Ridiculous? How else do you get these built if a majority agrees they don’t want them because they can drive up energy rates and use a lot of water (both problems pretty much solved), as well as employ people ephemerally, while laying off people permanently? 7. Switcheroo from Morgan Stanley within the semiconductor equipment group: Lam Research goes to buy from hold, while Applied Materials moves to hold from buy. Applied Materials just reported a fantastic quarter, but analysts see the magnitude of revisions narrowing for DRAM memory equipment, hence the downgrade. They’re more positive on NAND revisions from here, which favors Lam. 8. CrowdStrike gets a price target increase to $700 from $525 at KeyBanc. Analysts say that cybersecurity gaps revealed by Anthropic’s Mythos are driving companies to increase spending to shore up their systems. It wasn’t that long ago that it was thought Anthropic’s replacement risk was throttling back cyber spending. CrowdStrike and Palo Alto Networks are Club names. 9. Bernstein starts Club stock Arm Holdings with an outperform, calling the chip designer a “structural beneficiary” of the resurgence in central processing units (CPUs). That’s exactly why we took a stake in Arm back in April. In a world where AI agents are proliferating, CPU demand is off the charts. 10. Citi opens a 90-day positive catalyst watch on Constellation Brands , the Mexican beer giant behind Modelo, Corona, and Pacifico. Comparisons are getting easier, and the World Cup could drive beer volumes. I have been watching what the new CEO, Nick Fink , will do with the portfolio now that Bill Newlands is no longer running the place. 4 more things on my radar 11. This is a pivotal week for the AI trade with Club name Nvidia set to report Wednesday night. We previewed the quarter yesterday in our week-ahead column for Club members. A pair of other Club stocks report this week: Home Depot and TJX Companies . 12. Truist starts coverage of TJX with a buy this morning. The Marshalls, HomeGoods, and T.J. Maxx parent is the biggest off-price retailer, which analysts said gives the company access to the best products and locations. We’ve loved and owned this one for years. Even bought more on Friday. 13. Longtime Wall Street strategist Ed Yardeni stirs up the bond vigilantes — after all, he did coin the term — by saying the economic backdrop “no longer supports an easing bias, let alone a rate cut.” No doubt, inflation driven by the war in Iran has dealt incoming Fed chief Kevin Warsh a tough hand. But this may be a needless provocation if Trump does anything to end the conflict and bring oil prices down. 14. We made a couple of trims this morning for the Club. You learn more about our rationale in our trade alert . Sign up for my Top 10 Morning Thoughts on the Market email newsletter for free (See here for a full list of the stocks at Jim Cramer’s Charitable Trust.) 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Jim Cramer’s top 10 things to watch in the stock market Monday
May 18, 2026
